PARENTS are celebrating after the University of Bradford postponed a decision that could have seen the closure of its on-site nursery.

The University has announced that the nursery, off Laisteridge Lane, will be safe for at least 12 months, after the decision over whether to keep it open was deferred by a year.

The decision comes after 552 people signed a petition calling for Vice Chancellor Brian Cantor to retain the university nursery, which offers child care for the children of students and staff.

The facility is also open to families with no links with the university, and earlier this month parents were told that the nursery's future was being reviewed, mainly because it was being used more by the wider community than those at the university.

The university says that it has now spoken with parents and come up with "positive proposals" to address the low uptake of university users at the nursery, which has operated for 23 years. It has around 80 children on the roll.

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A spokesman for the University said: "The University of Bradford is committed to supporting staff and students with young children, and over the last week we have had very good discussions with parents and staff about the review of the nursery.

"Those discussions have produced some positive proposals aimed at addressing concerns about the low uptake of the provision by members of the University, and the financial position of the nursery.

"We believe the proposals are promising enough to work together on, and so we are deferring any decision on the nursery’s future for 12 months until we have had a chance to test out some of the ideas in practice.

"We would like to thank parents, staff and students who have engaged so positively in these discussions and look forward to working together."

The petition was set up by Sarah Cartin, whose two children attended the nursery when she was a student, and still attend summer school there. She feels that the heartfelt messages written by many who signed the petition showed how important the nursery was to many Bradford families.

She said: "There were an awful lot of current and former users signing the petition, and leaving relevant and quite emotional messages. I think the messages people left and the fact that they took their time to sign the petition did the world of good in this campaign.

"There were really personal comments from parents and grandparents. It is really positive that we have an extra 12 months, it will give the nursery a chance to review what it can do to provide a better service for students, staff the University and the wider community.

"Hopefully we don't have to do this again in 12 months time."